Many people start their home search online by checking out Zillow’s Zestimate feature, which estimates your home’s value—and that’s okay. Most of those people just want a ballpark estimate of how much they might get for their home.

However, it’s important to understand that Zestimates are not an accurate estimate of what your home would sell for in today’s market. Zillow hasn’t been in your home, so they don’t know if you have any value-boosting upgrades that need to be factored into the home’s price.

To create a Zestimate, all Zillow does is take the average of what properties similar to yours in square footage have sold for in order to give you a figure to work with. Notice that those values can change by thousands of dollars on even a monthly basis.

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Zestimates are not an accurate estimateof what your home would sell for in today’s market.

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This is why it’s important to invite a professional to help you determine your home’s true market value. You wouldn’t go online to get a diagnosis about a serious disease, would you? You probably wouldn’t, and that’s why you shouldn’t trust your most valuable asset to a Zestimate.

If you have any questions about real estate, please feel free to reach out to us. We’d be happy to help.